Burnley boss insists there is money available to him to strengthen squad

Burnley are in a stronger position in the transfer market than at any time in manager Sean Dyche’s two and a half year reign.

Following a season in the Premier League, and the sales of Danny Ings to Liverpool, and Kieran Trippier’s impending switch to Spurs, the Clarets are in a powerful position to challenge in the Championship.

There is money available, but it still has to be kept at a reasonable level because there has to be a Burnley Football Club

Sean Dyche

And, amid interest in skipper Jason Shackell, keeper Tom Heaton and left back Stephen Ward, Dyche insists: “We can be more productive in keeping our players and bringing new players in.”

Burnley were awarded £62.5m in prize money from the Premier League, with the sales of Ings and Trippier – expected to be completed imminently at the time of going to press – likely to bring in around £10m.

Dyche is hoping to tie up a £1m deal for Aston Villa’s Matt Lowton as Trippier’s replacement, and said, amid criticism of Burnley’s dealings last season, and so far this summer: “I’ve made it clear there were things that were alive that went away from us last year, not, from our doing.

“That sometimes is the nature of recruitment. You can keep throwing money at a situation that is just not available.

“So it is finding the right ones. I speak to some of the big name managers in this country, they have exactly the same problem, it’s just a different level of the market.

“There is the idea of ‘Does the club want to sell?; Does the player want to come?; Is everyone happy with the deal?’. It goes on at any level of football, but it’s fair to say we’re in a stronger position to be part of that than we have been in my time at this football club.”

Dyche added: “We’re in a position to be more pro-active than we have over the last few years, but we also know the market offers sometimes situations where the money goes ridiculously high.

“There is money available, but it still has to be kept at a reasonable level because there has to be a Burnley Football Club.

“The thing that’s changed the Championship market is that there are so many clubs that are so wealthy now.

“We’re relatively new to the wealth scene, certainly since I came to this football club. I didn’t spend hardly a penny for 18 months, whereas clubs over the last 10 years have put lots of money on the pitch to try to get into the Premier League.

“I think that skews the market because they’re not under pressure, some of these owners are that wealthy they just throw money at it anyway and just dish out new contracts.

“Historically, usually there would be a couple of clubs that either needed to sell – as we did a couple of years ago – or maybe just wanted to bring one in and get one out. There are some squads now that are stockpiling players.

“We’ll see. We’ve got money and we are flexible with how much we want to spend. There still is a certainly limit for a club of this size.”

Asked whether he had been given a figure of what he has to spend. he added: “There’s flexibility now. There wasn’t before.

“Last season and this season there’s more financial flexibility. But there still is a reality to the club. People sometimes forget that.

“The reality of a club of this size, for example if you did have £10million to go and spend on one player you have to pay the wages of that £10million player.

“People think you can do the wages or do the fee. It doesn’t work like that. There still has to be a balance to it.

“There is a reality to this football club – there always has been, this is not new information.

“I would say that has moved forward though, so we can be more productive in keeping our players and bringing new players in.”

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